


Soldier On

by bioticbootyshaker



Category: Mass Effect
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-06-12
Updated: 2013-06-12
Packaged: 2017-12-14 18:41:02
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 19,955
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/840103
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bioticbootyshaker/pseuds/bioticbootyshaker
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“You love me,” Shepard said. Conversationally, like he was discussing the weather or where to find the best food on the Citadel. </p>
<p>Kaidan swallowed wrong, whiskey flooding his nose. He coughed and sputtered, setting his glass down and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. His eyes watered and his nose ran, and he excused himself to clean up.</p>
<p>“I never, ah… I never said I loved you, just…” Kaidan sighed and brushed off his uniform with a napkin, distracting himself from looking into Shepard’s eyes. “I just, well… Look, Commander, I’m not exactly the most experienced at this stuff, you know? I just know I think about you, and when I see you I get this feeling in my stomach that… That if I don’t get you, if I don’t have you, I’m just going crazy.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Chapter One

One moment, a person could be the same as they’d always been; weary eyes and crooked smile and scarred knuckles. The next, they were entirely different, at least to your eyes. You noticed the shape of his body under his fatigues and the restless way he stood when there was nothing to do, shoulders hunched and fingers drumming and feet shifting. You noticed, too, that his smile rarely reached his eyes, and that he hadn’t shaved in a few days and maybe that he spoke too much or too little depending on how little sleep he’d gotten.

Shepard would never bare his soul, and that was the worst part of it. Vulnerability had never been an option, and up until Kaidan had started _noticing_ him, he’d admired that about him. Because Kaidan had always been something of an exposed nerve, too vulnerable for his own good. John couldn’t bring down his barriers, and there was no getting around them. He ate and slept and breathed the job, and there wasn’t room for anything else.

So instead of fixating on those intricacies and subtleties and quirks he’d noticed, Kaidan soldiered up and focused on the job. If he couldn’t break down barriers, then the least he could do was ignore they were even there, and ignore the man with his tired eyes sitting behind them.

Kaidan had plenty to keep him distracted, after all. Saren was somewhere out there, hiding somewhere amongst the stars, and what he was planning was incomprehensible. Kaidan couldn’t understand why any sapient being would want the eradication of an entire galaxy, and he didn’t much care what Saren’s reasoning was, or his hollow justifications. He would take him down, the same way he’d taken down countless others over the years; a shot between the eyes and everything was over. 

The Reapers were above his pay grade, and honestly more than Kaidan cared to consider or even attempt to wrap his head around; but a rogue spectre… that was something Kaidan could deal with, an enemy he could easily comprehend and recognize and fight against. Whether Saren was indoctrinated or only morbidly idealistic didn’t make a difference. He was responsible for the deaths of countless people, and he wouldn’t get away with it.

He let himself drown in his work, taking pleasure in the ceaselessness of it. They rooted geth out of their outposts and disposed of them. They dealt with the Rachni, struck a deal with their Queen that sent her skittering into the wilds of Noveria. They hunted and killed Benezia, all the while watching Liara closely, waiting with their breath held to see if she would cry, or flinch, or beg them to spare her mother.

She didn’t.

All of these things they did, without any recompense or thanks from the Council, without any kind of mention or gratitude. None of them cared much. It was nice to explore the edges of Council space, to do good work for the sake of simply doing good work. It was nice, even, to get lost in the overwhelming wave of everything they battled against; the hopelessness of their mission, the helplessness of their bodies, the size and terrible scale of their enemies – their _true_ enemies, not their puppet Saren.

All the while, Kaidan found himself coming back to Shepard. He understood it was a battle he could never hope to win, staying away from the man, pushing him from his thoughts, pretending he didn’t dream about him at night and wake up with sweat running down his back and his heart pounding and his cock hard. Shepard was the flame, and Kaidan was the proverbial moth, flitting around him, crashing himself into that light to feel its warmth. 

Shepard spoke with him the same way he did the others on the squad. There didn’t seem to be any kind of special affection for Kaidan, or any kind of subtle nuances in the movement of his body or the light in his eyes. He was simply Commander John Shepard, Alliance Navy, one hell of a soldier and one hell of a good man who just so happened to be one hell of a thorn in Kaidan’s heart. 

There might have been some solace if Kaidan could have just gotten a handle on him. If he’d been able to know what Shepard was all about, what he wanted, what he needed, what he craved in the middle of the night when _he_ woke up with his heart pounding and sweat on his back and his dick hard. But of course, Kaidan didn’t have the slightest clue. He was labyrinthine, twisting and uncertain. He was kaleidoscopic, constantly shifting and changing and so bright and lovely and _frightening_ that Kaidan felt like he might go crazy.

Kaidan wanted to forget him, to be as detached as Shepard. He wanted to have a conversation with the man where he didn’t rip out his own heart and pin it to his sleeve. He wanted, more than anything, to speak to Shepard, plainly and honestly, and lay it all out for him, let him see every inch of him. If Shepard said he wasn’t interested, it was fine, at least then he could let go and move on and commit himself to the mission. 

Everyone except for Shepard seemed aware of the heat between them, or at least the heat that Kaidan kept for the man, under his ribs and around his heart. Ashley told him to talk to Shepard, to man up and be an adult. “This isn’t poetry, LT. Quietly pining never got anyone anything.”

He had to smile at that, because she was right. The things in life worth having were worth fighting for. But this wasn’t a promotion or a badge of honor, this was a man who confounded him and confused him and consumed him. 

“Pardon my French, but that’s bullshit,” Ashley said, when Kaidan pointed out that there was too much at stake to make a move. “That’s what cowards say when they don’t have the guts to go for what they want. If you want to sit here and mope and pine and get no sleep, whatever. I’m not gonna tell you how to live your life.”

He smiled wider. Of course she would, but she’d at least attempt to be subtle about it. Since he’d met Ash, she’d ridden him hard over everything, his romantic life, his mannerisms, his quiet nature, his shyness. She did it with the best of intentions, and with a hard kind of sweetness that was unique to her, and for that Kaidan found it more amusing than irritating. 

Even Tali, who Kaidan had always assumed was a little more naïve about anything of a sexual or romantic nature, told him that he should tell Shepard how he felt. And yet, Shepard remained entirely unaware… or worse, so uninterested in Kaidan that he didn’t even want to discuss anything with him. Kaidan wasn’t sure which he preferred. 

No good came from remaining silent, or hoping Shepard might pick up on his not-so-subtle hint; honestly, Kaidan didn’t know how long you could look at a guy with sultry eyes and your hip leaned against a counter and your hand on his arm before he got the hint that you might be interested in more than a professional relationship. 

So, when things were quiet and still for them, when they weren’t hunting and planning and mapping and coordinating and fighting their way through hordes of geth, Kaidan went to him. He went to him with all of his courage and want and love pinned to his chest, with too much beer in his stomach and too much sweat on his palms. He went to Shepard, in his cabin that was always too cold and too dark, and he sat down with him. 

He went and he told him everything. His voice broke a few times, and he had to stop to clear his throat too often. He told him with his hands trembling and his fingers laced together too tightly and his back slumped like he was admitting something that sat heavy on his shoulders. He was, actually, but still, he thought he was braver than that, he thought he could bear more weight than that.

Shepard sat there, quiet and still like everything else, for a while after Kaidan was through. Kaidan kept waiting for him to say something, _anything_ , but Shepard had the patience of a saint, and the ability to be terribly cruel with his silence. 

Kaidan laughed; a hectic sound that made him flush. “Hey, you know, it’s okay if you… I mean, if you don’t feel the same. I just thought I should, ah… Let you know, or. Yeah. It’s okay, though.”

The silence was sharp, like a knife digging into him and making him bleed. Kaidan bit his lips, hated himself for being so awkward and uncomfortable, and flicked his eyes up to Shepard’s. He was sitting there like he had all the time in the world, like someone hadn’t just ripped their heart open and slipped it into his hand, like Kaidan wasn’t sitting there waiting for him to say _something._

“You want a drink, Lieutenant?”

Kaidan blinked, feeling absolutely stupid, feeling like he’d been punched in the stomach. He must have looked the way he felt, because Shepard chuckled and grabbed a bottle of whiskey from the table between them. He poured them both a glass, and pushed Kaidan his with a smile on his face. 

Okay, so, it wasn’t as awkward as Kaidan had been fearing. He was smiling, so that was probably a good sign. What Kaidan knew about romance could fit on the head of a pin, but he assumed when you tore your heart open for someone and they smiled, the chances were good that you hadn’t made the biggest mistake of your life.

“Yeah,” Kaidan murmured. “Okay, Commander.”

They drank together in silence, the only noise the clinking of ice in their glasses and their quiet noises of admiration for the strong whiskey. It had been a while since Kaidan had tasted good whiskey, and he let himself relax, enjoying the warmth in his throat, the fire sinking down in his belly, the blunted edges of his thoughts. 

“You love me,” Shepard said. Conversationally, like he was discussing the weather or where to find the best food on the Citadel. 

Kaidan swallowed wrong, whiskey flooding his nose. He coughed and sputtered, setting his glass down and wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. His eyes watered and his nose ran, and he excused himself to clean up.

“I never, ah… I never said I loved you, just…” Kaidan sighed and brushed off his uniform with a napkin, distracting himself from looking into Shepard’s eyes. “I just, well… Look, Commander, I’m not exactly the most experienced at this stuff, you know? I just know I think about you, and when I see you I get this feeling in my stomach that… That if I don’t get you, if I don’t _have_ you, I’m just going crazy.”

Shepard looked at him, watched him with those blue, deep eyes that revealed nothing. Kaidan felt naked under Shepard’s stare, exposed and vulnerable with every pulse and muscle and vital part of him on display. He trusted Shepard, but he wasn’t sure he trusted him with everything, with everything he was and thought and felt and _desired._

“Come here,” Shepard said. Not a command, not really. He said it softly, with more sensuality than Kaidan had ever heard from him. Kaidan moved to him on legs that weren’t quite steady, stopping in front of him. He felt even more exposed, like Shepard could see straight through him, into the heart of him that no one knew. 

He gripped Kaidan’s hips, pulling him closer until his face was pressed against Kaidan’s stomach. Kaidan felt his breath shiver through his lungs. He tried to breathe and steady himself, but he couldn’t. It felt like some kind of dream, perfectly imperfect and tenebrous and easily broken. He didn’t want to move, or speak, or do anything that might shatter the moment. Kaidan closed his eyes and traced his fingertips over Shepard’s shorn hair, feeling the shape of his skull, the ridges of bone and old scars. 

“I don’t need you going crazy, Alenko,” Shepard said. His breath was warm against Kaidan’s stomach, through his fatigues. Kaidan shivered and made some noise that was weak and plaintive and desperate. Shepard’s fingers slid under his shirt, pushing the fabric up to bunch under Kaidan’s nipples. His lips touched his abs, soft and too hot. Kaidan made that noise again, wishing he could sound stronger, wishing he could do more than tremble and flush and get hard.

“Shepard,” Kaidan managed to whisper. His voice was raspy, rough with want and desire, and he swallowed. “Shepard, you… You don’t really have to---“

Shepard sank his teeth against Kaidan’s hip, running his tongue along the groove that disappeared under his pants. It felt so good it almost hurt, all the heat and blood and aching want centering under his belt. His knees were trembling, like he’d never been in someone’s hand or under their mouth – but that’s the way it felt when Shepard touched him. 

There wasn’t enough air in the room, or space, or _time_. Kaidan felt the horrible weight of everything, the horrible understanding that he could never have enough time to drown in Shepard, to trace the scars on his scalp and knuckles, to feel his mouth against his skin and his breath damp and hot, to _love_ him. He felt ridiculous with how badly the realization hurt him that they might not have much time at all; he had always been pragmatic, level-headed, a staunch realist – but Shepard shook him to his core and made him feel like that kid back in brain camp; small and scrawny and awkward and desperate for _more._

Shepard kissed higher, tongue riding the shape of Kaidan’s ribs and circling his nipple. His teeth plucked lightly, gently, like he was scared of hurting Kaidan, or like he was testing the threshold, trying to understand what Kaidan wanted and what he could handle. 

He could handle a hell of a lot. He’d never been made of glass.

“Want you so bad,” Kaidan said, his speech slurred like he was drunk. But of course the only intoxicating thing he had imbibed was the sight and taste of Shepard; and he figured that was more disorienting than any alcohol. He kissed Shepard with his hand cupped against his jaw, fingers dug in so tight they left bruises. Well, Shepard had never been made of glass either. He could take it.

Kaidan moaned between Shepard’s teeth when he was gripped under his ass and hauled into Shepard’s arms. He was suddenly light-headed, unused to be picked up and spun around and handled like he weighed no more than a feather. It was intensely, impractically romantic and sensual and ridiculous, and Kaidan loved it, loved him, loved the shape their bodies made together. 

Everything he had been holding back was suddenly set free, through his kiss, his touch, his sigh and laugh and moan. Everything was pushed out of him through his pores and his breath and Kaidan felt clean, felt like he’d been washed in white-hot fire, something incredibly pure. He laughed for no other reason than it felt good to laugh, and Shepard laughed with him, a quiet chuckle against Kaidan’s pulse. 

“I think you might need to lie down,” Shepard said, walking to the bed and tossing Kaidan down. He smirked and climbed onto the bed between Kaidan’s legs. Kaidan could feel his heart beating against his ribs and his blood rushing through him. He could feel the shape of Shepard’s cock through his pants when he pressed down against him, rocking his hips and sending threads of white through Kaidan’s vision.

When he’d set out to tell Shepard what he felt, Kaidan had never believed they’d end up the way they had. He’d thought, even if Shepard wanted him too, that his duty and his commitment to the mission would come first. Shepard had never been a cold man, but he had always been a determined man, and when there was an enemy in front of him he rarely had time to think about anything else. It made him a damn good soldier – one of the best – but it also made him distant, and oddly mechanical.

To feel him the way he was, hot and tense and trembling under his hands, was understanding that every myth and legend had its roots in the bones and flesh of ordinary people. Shepard had been built up so high that even those who had known him long before his name had been whispered through the galaxy saw him as something of a paragon. But Kaidan felt the truth, hard against his thigh and damp under his hands and quivering against his chest; Shepard was infinitely and terribly and beautifully _human._

Kaidan wished he could have lived in that moment forever; the closeness and the heat and the depth and breadth of emotion, but Shepard broke the contact of their bodies and sat up between Kaidan’s knees. Funny, he was patient enough when he was listening to reports about the weather conditions on Noveria before a drop and standing in front of the Council hearing their latest excuse not to give him what he needed… but in that moment, and that setting, he was like a child who wanted what he wanted when he wanted it; and Kaidan wouldn’t dare slow him down.

The room was silent except for Kaidan’s heavy breathing and the sound of fabric against skin as Shepard peeled off his shirt and worked on his pants. Kaidan took the opportunity to get himself naked, flushing a bit when he was laid out in front of Shepard without a stitch of cloth to hide behind. He’d never been self-conscious of his body, but the way Shepard looked at him, his eyes and expression unreadable, made him squirm a little. 

Exposed, that was the word. Exposed to the cold, exposed to the darkness, exposed to those eyes he could never, ever see behind. Kaidan waited for Shepard to touch him, to kiss him, to fuck him or bruise him or ruin him in the only way he knew how; but Shepard only stayed there on his knees, caught between Kaidan’s thighs, looking down at him. His burst of impatience seemed to have passed, and he was taking his time in doing the things Kaidan wanted him to do.

His hand swept up Kaidan’s thigh, thumb kneading, over the taut skin. Shepard made a noise in his throat, a chuckle mixed with grunt, and massaged his thumb over Kaidan’s hip. He could feel Kaidan trembling, of course he could; Kaidan would be surprised if the entire _ship_ couldn’t feel him trembling.

“You’ve always been pretty good about speaking your mind, Alenko,” Shepard murmured. “So… tell me what you want.”

Months of waiting and wanting and aching and burning and lusting and loving culminated in one moment where he could finally and at long last leech the beautiful poison from his blood and lay everything out neatly and cleanly. And Kaidan couldn’t speak, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move. He laid there with his thighs open and his dick hard against his stomach and his eyes closed and he waited for time and space to swallow him up, to give him some kind of relief.

Shepard laughed, like something was funny, like something could possibly be funny, and he leaned down to press his lips against Kaidan’s throat.

“Getting shy, huh?” Shepard whispered. His hand moved lower, fingertips tracing the sensitive skin of Kaidan’s ass, edging between his cheeks to flick against his hole. “Nothing you wanna say, Kaidan?”

Kaidan mumbled against Shepard’s lips. 

“What was that?” Shepard asked. “Can’t really hear you, Lieutenant.”

“Fuck me,” Kaidan said, louder than he’d intended, more desperate than he’d wanted. His eyes opened, and he met Shepard’s stare boldly. Funny, he had thought Shepard’s eyes were unreadable, but now he could read them just fine. They were hot, and lustful, and not at all professional. Kaidan smiled, feeling a bit of that boldness grab hold of him, and gripped Shepard’s wrist, applying more pressure against his hole. “Fuck me, Commander. With your fingers, your tongue, your dick, I don’t care. Just get inside me.”

Shepard kissed him, hard, crashing their mouths together and catching his teeth on Kaidan’s bottom lip. There was so much raw animal power in him, so much savagery that Kaidan had seen on the battlefield and wanted to get a taste of in the bedroom. It scared him, really, how much he craved Shepard, how much he wanted him inside of him, all over him, in his body and his mind and his heart. Kaidan wanted him unleashed, freed of all false pleasantry and false pretenses. He wanted Shepard _uncaged_ , and it was a want that was powerful enough to shake his ribs.

He bit Kaidan’s lips raw, red and bruised and throbbing. He distracted him with the kiss, toyed with him, teased him, while he slicked up his fingers and pushed them inside. Kaidan bucked, whined against Shepard’s mouth, curled his toes into the bed. 

There was tremendous, almost unbearable energy flooding through him, like lightning in his veins, and it took his breath away. It wasn’t the first time he’d had someone’s fingers inside of him, but it was the first time he’d had Shepard’s fingers inside of him, and that meant his body burned a little hotter and trembled a little deeper. Kaidan could never hope to explain the phenomenon of being so _consumed_ by another person that the way they breathed and moved and simply _existed_ made your heart skip a beat.

Shepard’s kiss moved from his battered mouth to his collarbone, his teeth nipping at the bone before sinking deep. It was not lightning in Kaidan’s veins then but gasoline and Shepard had just thrown a match inside of him.

“Please,” Kaidan panted. He could barely hear himself over the thunder of blood through his ears. “Please.”

“Tell me what you want, Alenko,” Shepard murmured. Cool, calm, relaxed, like he wasn’t knuckle deep in Kaidan’s ass or sucking a hickey onto his throat. 

_Drive me nuts_ , Kaidan thought. _Drive me fucking nuts._

“Fuck me,” Kaidan said.

Shepard chuckled, curling his fingers inside of him. “Looks like I am.”

Kaidan looked at him. No trembling, no quivering, no begging, no stumbling or stammering. He looked at Shepard with his eyes on fire and said: “Fuck me.”

He moved so seamlessly between patience and impatience that Kaidan didn’t know what to think. One moment he was taking his time, using his mouth and his hands and taking pleasure in rubbing their slick skin together, and the next he was pulling Kaidan on top of him, settling his hands on Kaidan’s hips as he pushed inside of him. 

It was a damn good thing no one could hear them, because Kaidan had always found it difficult to keep quiet. He moaned and shouted Shepard’s name and rode him hard and fast, not bothering to keep a steady rhythm, just wanting friction and heat. 

For such an irregular rhythm, Shepard kept up beautifully, bucking his hips when Kaidan lowered and lowering his hips when Kaidan rode high on his cock. Kaidan curled his nails into Shepard’s chest, losing himself to the raw need that ate at his bones, that rose up out of his skin and fogged his vision and made him something animal.

There was a terrible kind of beauty to that bestial power. Kaidan had experienced it before when he’d watched Shepard on the battlefield, covered in blood and sweat, but wonderfully, wholly _alive_. And _that_ was what was so beautiful about being uncaged and untethered and _unleashed_ , Kaidan could honestly say he had never felt more alive. He had never been so aware of his own heart beating and his own lungs filling and collapsing as he breathed and his own flushed skin and trembling muscles. He had never been so painfully aware of his own body, and it was incredibly and ineffably _lovely_.

Shepard came first, hard and sudden, bucking roughly once or twice before stilling under him. Kaidan tried to crawl off of his hips, but Shepard grabbed hold of his cock and started stroking, looking up at him with his eyes half-lidded and his lips wet and parted. It didn’t take long for Kaidan to come, a few passes over his cock and he was coming over Shepard’s stomach and chest, making noises that belonged in the throat of some wild animal.

He came down slowly, blissfully unaware of everything but Shepard’s body and Shepard’s mouth and Shepard’s warmth. Blissfully unaware of the galaxy that spun around them and the looming threat of the Reapers and the battle that awaited them. For a little while he was content enough to be held and melt against Shepard’s body. Nothing else mattered, because nothing else was in front of him.

Later, when the sweat had cooled on them, Kaidan and Shepard stumbled into the shower and washed. Truth be told it was the laziest shower Kaidan had ever taken, both of them soaping up and roaming their hands over one another and pressing small, tired kisses against shoulder-blades and throats. When they were through, they moved back to the bed, coming together seamlessly, their bodies fitting together like they’d been made for each other. 

And maybe they had, Kaidan wasn’t so old and so jaded that he couldn’t be a little romantic. Pragmatism be damned, it was nice to believe he had been made to be there, made to press against Shepard, made to fit him like the last piece of a complicated jigsaw puzzle. 

“You plan on sleeping here, Lieutenant?”

Kaidan smiled. “Ah, you know, I was considering it.”

Shepard’s lips pressed against his forehead, and his arm wrapped tighter around Kaidan’s shoulders. They could both pretend, in that moment, that there was nothing ahead of them but the stars, and nothing to do but lie together and let the galaxy spin on and on around them. 

No Reapers, no Geth, no Saren, no threat; just the two of them, naked and close and hearts too young for their bodies. 

“Tell you what,” Shepard murmured. “You keep smelling so good, you can stay as long as you want.”

Kaidan figured it was as close to, _I love you_ , as he was likely to get.

That night, anyway.


	2. Broken Ribs

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After a few weeks of not-so-secret trysts, Shepard worries Kaidan's infatuation might be a bit more than he first thought.

Chapter Two

“You look pretty happy, LT.”

Kaidan tried his best to wipe the smile from his face, but he couldn’t quite manage it. The best he could do was thin his lips, but even then he could feel them trembling with a grin. The previous night was still too strong in his mind. He could still feel Shepard inside of him, his fingers on his hips, that shape of his teeth on his throat. There was a hickey at his collarbone and neck, and Kaidan didn’t even bother trying to hide them.

Ashley raised an eyebrow when Kaidan hummed and turned from her, tapping at his Omni-tool like he had something important that demanded his attention.

She had never been easily dismissed, however, and she stepped around and stood in front of him, leaning over into his face until Kaidan was forced to sigh and meet her eyes, albeit grudgingly.

“You want to tell me what happened last night? Seriously, Alenko, I know the universal, _I just got laid_ , expression. And it’s all over your face.”

He flushed. Kaidan had thought he was a little too old to flush when discussing his sex life, but he supposed you never really outgrew the embarrassment of it. Ashley had a strange way of invading his space and getting in his face; she always managed to do it in a way that made Kaidan smile. If anyone else had been asking him about his night with Shepard, Kaidan would have simply walked away, or told them it was none of their damn business. But with Ash… 

It was different. He wanted to tell her, to confide in her. 

So he told her everything.

Ashley listened to him, even when he stammered and his voice got soft over the more… salacious parts. She smirked when he was through, leaned back against the wall with her arms crossed over her chest. It was nice that she was so relaxed. Kaidan felt anything but; his hands were trembling, his temples ached, his palms were sweaty, and his face was so flushed he could feel himself burning under her eyes.

“I told you to tell him how you felt,” Ash said. “Not have sex with him. You know how many rules and regulations you broke in one night, LT?”

“Ah, all the ones worth breaking, I’d imagine,” Kaidan said. He grinned and so did Ash, and Kaidan felt his hands still. 

“Not sure how I feel about your fraternizing,” Ash said. “Especially with the Commander. Next thing you know he’ll be sending me to clean out a nest of Rachni while he lets you sit on the Normandy and kick your feet up.”

“He wouldn’t do that,” Kaidan argued. “He’s not the type. If anything it means he’ll work me twice as hard to show everyone else there’s no favoritism.”

She looked serious all of a sudden, like he’d said or done something wrong. Kaidan didn’t enjoy the rollercoaster of emotion he was riding on. He wanted to be happy, to take some kind of pleasure in the fact that he’d spent an amazing night with an amazing man, but the way Ashley looked… 

“Listen, Kaidan,” Ashley started, gently, seriously, like she was about to teach him some kind of painful, brutally honest lesson. There was an age gap between them, Kaidan was sure he was older than her by about six or seven years, but when she spoke, she reduced him to a little boy, and when she pulled out a chair and nodded for him to sit, he sat.

“Skipper is… I mean the Commander, he’s… There’s a lot going on right now, for him, for all of us.” She sat across from him and placed her elbows on her knees, leaning over. It would have been easy to hide from her eyes, to look away and keep the pretense that he was stronger than her alive, but Kaidan couldn’t quite do it. He looked into Ash’s eyes and he listened. “I just think you might be putting a little more thought into all of this than he is. I think maybe you’re a little more invested, that’s all. I don’t want you getting your heart kicked around, Alenko.”

“Wouldn’t be the first time,” he said. He tried to laugh, make it sound like a throwaway, something that didn’t dig thorns into his heart and curl tight enough to rob him of his breath. 

“Just… be careful,” Ashley said. “That’s all I’m trying to say.”

“Yeah,” Kaidan murmured. “I’m always careful.”

Bound and trapped and strangled, actually. He’d been careful his entire life, and the few times he’d thrown caution to the wind hadn’t worked in his favor. Life, it seemed, was a contact sport, and Kaidan was tired of playing tag, tired of sitting on the sidelines and not letting his heart get kicked and battered and bruised and roughed up. If he was going to have his heart broken, then he wanted it _broken_ , shattered and bleeding and torn apart; because at the end of the day, everything was so terribly finite, everything was so ceaselessly moving them towards the end. 

Regret was something that was natural, but it wasn’t something Kaidan had the time or energy for. He’d just as soon go out bloodied and swinging than meekly and undamaged. 

Still, he listened to her, because she needed him to listen, and because he loved her, in that sweet way that couldn’t be defined, by her poets or his own experience. 

*****

“Heard you and the Lieutenant had a little… rendezvous last night.”

Shepard had been waiting for someone to bring it up. The Normady was a large ship, but nothing ever went unnoticed. He couldn’t even sneak a bite of food from the kitchen without someone finding out about it; why he assumed he’d be able to fuck Kaidan Alenko without anyone knowing was beyond him.

He sighed, shutting his locker harder than he’d intended. Garrus didn’t flinch, however, and all of Shepard’s power evaporated when he looked at him. There was a hell of a lot he didn’t know about Turians, but there was one thing he _did_ know, and it was a damn frustrating thing; you could never quite build yourself up enough when you met their eyes. You could be the strongest, baddest, _toughest_ person in the galaxy, and then you _weren’t._

Intimidating appearance aside, Garrus had proven himself to be a bit soft-hearted. Shepard hadn’t expected the man to have such a gentle nature, especially considering he’d seen him in battle and during confrontations, and he was everything _but_ gentle. When it came to _people_ , though, Garrus tended to handle everything with more compassion than everyone else. Ashley approached every situation ready to throttle someone, Wrex was just as apt to shoot someone in the face as say hello, Tali and Kaidan both proved too distant when dealing with others – albeit they both had their deep wells of compassion – but Garrus…

Garrus was intensely and intrinsically _good_. Not in the pure way that most people thought of when they heard the word, but in the _just_ way, in the _fair_ way, in the working himself to the bone to make the world safer way. 

So it should have come as no surprise that when he looked at him, Shepard didn’t feel the need to hide much. He and Garrus had grown close over the short time they’d known one another, closer than either of them had expected, considering the circumstances. Shepard saw him as more than a friend; he was a confidant, a brother, someone that Shepard could honestly say he would miss when and if the war ended. 

“Should’ve known you’d want to talk about it,” Shepard said. “So go ahead, Garrus, let me have it.”

“Right here in the cargo bay, Commander?”

“Cute,” Shepard muttered. 

“Well, now that you mention it, someone might have told me that a certain lieutenant went to see you last night. And that same someone might have told me that he left a few hours later looking a little… _Unkempt._ ”

“This someone wouldn’t happen to be Liara, would it?” Shepard asked.

“I don’t reveal my sources, Shepard. It’s a Turian thing.”

Garrus leaned against the lockers, looking like he was waiting for Shepard to make some grand, dramatic confession; like he expected _details._ Shepard didn’t even know how to feel about _that,_ but if Garrus wanted the long and short of it, Shepard wasn’t shy. Hell, it’d been a long time since he’d been with anyone, and he didn’t think he’d ever been with anyone like Kaidan. The guy could tangle him into knots, get inside of him and thread through his blood like wine or poison or something else sweet and dangerous. For a night, Shepard had been content to fuck someone, to kiss them and touch them and rest his head against them. He didn’t think it needed a lot of defining or explaining.

“We talked for a bit,” Shepard said. “There might have been some… horsing around.” He smirked, matching Garrus’ posture and leaning against the lockers. “It’s a human thing.”

“There’s a lot of things that are uniquely human,” Garrus agreed. “But, ah, ‘ _horsing around_ ’ isn’t one of them, Shepard.”

“It was nice,” Shepard said. He was surprised by his own candidness, and judging by Garrus’ expression, so was he. Living with the certainty that you might die any day did have its advantages, though. It made telling the truth a hell of a lot easier, and living with embarrassment a non-factor. “We talked, we drank, had a few laughs. He told me he loved me and I fucked him.”

_There._ Garrus was genuinely shocked. Shepard smiled, a little smugly, and shrugged. 

“It wasn’t complicated,” Shepard said.

“Except for the part where he told you he loves you,” Garrus said. “Yeah, not complicated at all. Unless that means something different to humans.”

The last thing Shepard wanted to think about was Lieutenant Kaidan Alenko and his little puppy-dog crush, or infatuation, or whatever word best described it. If it was love, it was a strange kind; the kind that came on sudden and strong and burned too damn hot to last. The best kind, if Shepard was being honest. The kind that scorched everything and left it in ruins; the kind that left no sustenance for anything deeper to sink in roots. 

“Sex is one thing,” Garrus said. “But, _spirits_ , Shepard…”

“It’s nothing,” Shepard said. “Just a little passing infatuation.”

“I haven’t known Alenko that long,” Garrus said. “But he doesn’t strike me as the ‘ _infatuation’_ type of guy. He’s got a good head on his shoulders. He’s not a child, Shepard, and neither are you.”

“When exactly did you become my mother, Vakarian?”

“Well, if I _was_ your mother I’d tell you not to think with that little head you have under your belt.”

“You’ve been studying human anatomy, Garrus,” Shepard said. “I’m touched.”

Garrus chuckled, and the tension passed. It wasn’t up to Garrus to decide what he did with himself, or who he slept with, or what commitments (or lack thereof) he made. It wasn’t up to Shepard, either, to explain himself or his decisions; though he felt obligated considering he was asking Garrus to follow him to hell and back. 

Even still, some things belonged only to him, under his ribs; the same way Garrus kept his own secrets hidden under armor and carapace. There really wasn’t a lot room for vulnerability for a soldier. And, despite Garrus’ feelings towards his time with the Turian military, they both were soldiers. Garrus had all the quiet focus of a soldier, all the steely resolve and penchant for shooting smoking holes in things with no more than a soft, slow exhale before squeezing the trigger.

“Be careful, that’s all,” Garrus said, and that was the only thing he would say on the matter. After that, they talked about poker, and drinking, and compared battle scars, and it was something familiar that Shepard could melt into, something comfortable that demanded no strong emotion and no strong attachment and no twisting, labyrinthine thoughts.

But Kaidan was there at the back of his mind, and Shepard couldn’t do anything to push him away. 

**

“You and the Commander---“

“Liara,” Kaidan sighed. “I really didn’t come here to talk about that.”

“I’m sorry,” Liara said. “I only… He’s an extraordinary man. You’re lucky to have his affections.”

What Kaidan had was probably the complete opposite of John Shepard’s ‘ _affections_ ’; he had a hickey on his throat and a bite mark on his collarbone and bruises in the shape of Shepard’s fingertips on his hips and ass. He had a night of fucking, and that didn’t necessarily mean he’d left with any more than he’d had when he’d entered Shepard’s cabin. What Ash had told him was still strong in his mind, and he worried it the way a person would a rotting tooth, poking at it over and over no matter how painful it was. 

Chances were good Shepard didn’t feel as strongly about him as Kaidan did for him, and that was okay. Kaidan was an adult, he was a soldier, and he’d be damned if a broken heart and a shattered ego would keep him from doing what needed to be done. At the same time, he wanted to keep some hope, some romanticism that hadn’t – despite all that he’d been through and seen and done – been worn away under harsh cynicism.

“Ah, thank you, I guess,” Kaidan murmured. “But I really just wanted to see how you were doing after—“

“I’m fine,” Liara said. “Really, I am. I just needed to… not think about her for a while.”

Sure, he could understand that. Or, if he couldn’t exactly understand, he could sympathize. Losing someone was never easy, and he could only imagine how it felt when the someone you lost was both your mother and your enemy. At least, Benezia had seemed like their enemy at the time; but given all she had said to them the moments before she’d died, Kaidan wasn’t too sure. 

“I saw him earlier,” Liara said. “He looked… happier, somehow. It’s difficult to describe but… There was a… _lightness_ about him. I think you bring out something soft in him, Kaidan, something _tender,_ and I think he needs that.”

Kaidan wasn’t sure how much longer he could keep blushing before he passed out. 

“You love him,” Liara said. No hesitation, no questions, no games; just that bald statement, like she was telling him about the weather on Feros. 

And, with the same startling lack of inhibition, Kaidan said: “Yeah.”

There was something powerfully freeing in having the truth out of him. He’d opened himself up to Shepard, but the word ‘love’ had been lacking from his little confession. He hadn’t wanted to scare Shepard off or make him feel like he was obligated to feel the same way, or---

The excuses were hollow and cowardly. The truth of the matter was, Kaidan had been afraid to be completely naked, completely exposed, completely vulnerable. He’d wanted to hide some of his heart away, and there was no getting around that.

“I’m going to give you some advice,” Liara said. Kaidan braced himself, waiting for Liara to tell him to be careful, to watch himself, to not open his chest wide and give Shepard ample room to crawl inside of him. Instead, Liara touched his hand, her fingers cool against his knuckles, and said: “Drown yourself in it. Drink everything until you’re sick from it. Your life is too short for half measures, Kaidan.”

She smiled at his stunned expression.

“Never come up for air,” Liara said. “That’s no way to love.”

**

Wrex was the only one who seemed to have no opinion on what he and Kaidan were doing together. According to him, humans were all soft and squishy, and he preferred not knowing what went on in the bedroom.

Shepard nearly hugged him.

**

Tali thought they were moving too fast. 

“Just—“

“Be careful,” Shepard said. “Yeah, I will.”

**

That night, there were no words.

Kaidan came to him and they melted together. No fumbling, no stumbling, no murmured apologies or soft, nervous laughter. Kaidan kissed him, curled his fingers against the shape of Shepard’s skull, and lowered himself onto his lap.

Slow down, be careful, take it easy, don’t give more of yourself than he’s willing to give you, let it be natural, let it be simple, never come up for air…

He felt like he was going to go crazy with all the thoughts racing through his mind. He wanted to center himself, to focus himself on one thing, on the feel of Shepard’s skull and the sharp taste of his mouth and the feel of his cock hard under him. Let whatever happened happen, there wasn’t enough time to worry over it, to pick at it and examine and analyze it until all of the passion and spontaneity and giddy, heady, child-like rush of want and need and _greed_ was sapped dry. 

“Want you,” Kaidan said. That was all he could say, all he could think, all he could _feel_ in his blood and his bones and his too tender heart. In the end, he imagined, he would be wrecked by this, set on fire and burned to ash; but in the moment – in _that_ moment – he was wholly alive, wholly aware, wholly and wonderfully _present_.

Unlike the previous night, Shepard was slower, he was gentler. His teeth didn’t mark him but nipped and tugged gently at every inch of skin they could find. His hands didn’t ravage but caressed, inching down the slope of Kaidan’s back and settling against his ass. Kaidan whispered his name, like some secret between them, pressing his face against Shepard’s throat and holding onto him like he was the one saving grace he had left; his last little bit of hope.

And maybe he was.

Kaidan lost himself when Shepard was inside of him. It was a frighteningly beautiful thing, to recognize that there were some things he wasn’t strong enough to stand, some things that transcended his flesh and his muscle and his tenacity. He let go and let himself drift along through the high Shepard sent him on. He remembered, vaguely, biting down roughly on Shepard’s shoulder, tasting the sharp copper of his blood. It brightened everything, sharpened colors and tastes and sounds until Kaidan was going crazy from it.

After, Shepard kissed his forehead and Kaidan kissed his shoulder in apology. Shepard held him and Kaidan let himself be held, let himself be small, and fragile, and terribly human. He was safe there, and if he had never been sure of anything in his entire life, he was sure of that. No matter what it meant, whatever it was they had together, he knew that much; he was safe.

For a while, it went on like that. Kaidan came to him and they blended together in heat and sweat and tangled legs. They laughed together, trembled together, traced the shapes of one another’s bodies with tongue and teeth and fingertips. They learned every curve and scar and imperfection.

And then… Something changed. Kaidan couldn’t put his finger on what, precisely, but something was different. He went to Shepard the same way he had countless times before, and Shepard kissed him and touched him and fucked him the same way he had countless times before. But there was a… shadow that hadn’t been there, in the corner of the room or the corner of Shepard’s eyes. There was a distance, small but there, and it was cold.

He laid there for a while after, staring up at the ceiling, flinching every time Shepard shifted, wondering if he was working up the courage to send him away. 

In the end, Shepard lacked the courage. Strange, considering he was _Commander John Shepard_ , Alliance Navy, the biggest badass in the galaxy according to everyone they’d ever met. But he was only human, pitiably and pathetically _human_ , and he held on too long to the things – to the _people_ – he desperately needed, or desperately _thought_ he needed. 

Or the people he thought he _should_ need.

So, Kaidan was brave for him. 

“It’s okay,” Kaidan whispered. He rolled over, moving blindly, so used to the shape of Shepard’s body that he found the line of his throat without any trouble. His lips touched his pulse, felt it quicken. Kaidan sighed against him. “It’s okay, Shepard.”

 

“I’m sorry,” Shepard said. Kaidan wasn’t used to his voice sounding so small, so forlorn, so _lost_. It hurt him, shards of glass stabbing into his heart, and he closed his eyes tighter. 

“It’s okay,” Kaidan repeated. “Really… Hey, it’s okay, Shepard.”

His hand was against Shepard’s cheek, his fingers tucked under his jaw. He wasn’t sure where he found the courage, but he met Shepard’s eyes and forced himself to hold them. 

_Never come up for air_ , Liara had told him. _There’s really no other way to love._

But, of course, there were many ways to love someone. Sometimes the most you could do was let go, let them move away from your arms no matter how much you’d convinced yourself it was where they belonged. 

He should have asked why. Why Shepard was pulling away from him, why Shepard was so drawing back when they fit so well together; their bodies and their mouths and the jagged edges of their hearts. But that was selfish, and Kaidan didn’t have it in him to be selfish, not that night. Maybe later, maybe when it was really over, when he breathed and Shepard wasn’t there to swallow it.

That night he was too tired to be selfish.

“It’s okay,” Kaidan said again, for what felt like the millionth time. He wasn’t aware he was doing it, but he was kissing Shepard’s face – his chin and cheeks and forehead and lips and eyelids. Kissing him like he meant to remember his face, remember the scar at his hairline and the crooked bridge of his nose and the cluster of freckles over his cheekbones and the hard lines around his eyes.

Remember and file it away and pull it out again when he wanted to torture himself in the middle of the night.

“I’m so damn sorry, Kaidan,” Shepard said. Now he sounded hoarse, close to some emotional edge. Kaidan wanted to see what happened if he fell over that edge, if he opened himself and exposed all the bleeding, sensitive parts of himself he hid behind bone and steel. But Kaidan loved him too much for that want to be anything but fleeting. 

What he wanted was to lie still and lie close and let whatever would come, come. He had fought everything his entire life, bearing his teeth and his claws and never backing down. But this wasn’t a battle, it was something far more delicate and complicated, and the last thing he wanted was to hurt him, to keep fighting when the battle was lost and the war was already over. 

So Kaidan let it be.

They laid together for a moment or a lifetime, and when he left, he left in silence and he left in understanding.

He would never love someone else the way he loved Shepard.

**

There wasn’t enough air. 

Kaidan listened to the reports of Shepard’s death with his chest empty and his lungs shuddering around shallow breath. There was a disconnect between his body and his mind. It wasn’t possible, and that was the only thing he knew; it wasn’t possible. Shepard couldn’t be dead. Shepard was made of stone and steel and pieced together with titanium. 

Shepard couldn’t be dead. 

For a while, Kaidan lived with that denial, cradled himself with it, wrapped it around himself like a protective shield. He hid behind it for months, growing distant from those he’d been friends with, shutting them out when they brought up how he needed to move on and let go.

It crashed in on him one night. He was standing at the window of an apartment that felt too empty and too cold. He looked out at the city, bright lights and busy people and the sound of traffic, and he thought; _Shepard would have hated it here_. 

And that was all it took. The next thing he knew he was on his knees with tears in his throat and fire in his chest and his stomach churning. He was drowning in grief, buried so deep under it that he didn’t think he could ever claw his way out. 

Shepard was gone. 

The man who had kissed him in the middle of the night and laughed against his teeth was gone. The man who had traced the curve of his shoulder-blade with his tongue and the shape of his hips with his fingertips was gone. The man who had curled up behind him, sweaty and tired and trembling, his body molding perfectly against him, was gone.

The savior of the Citadel, the first human Spectre, the first person Kaidan had loved – the kind of love where he’d ripped his heart out and open and handed it over without caution or care – was gone.

_I’m so damn sorry, Kaidan…_

For a long while, Kaidan remained on his knees. He didn’t bother to wipe his tears away, or pull himself up, or dust himself off, or soldier on. He just stayed on his knees and looked out over the city and felt his heart shift painfully inside of him, broken glass in a broken set of ribs. 

“It’s okay,” Kaidan whispered. “It’s okay, Shepard.”

The response was silence.


	3. Too Little, Too Late

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After their meeting on Horizon, Shepard struggles with how he feels about Kaidan.

Chapter Three

Kaidan was happy enough to be stationed on Horizon. The work there was slow, and constant, and kept him from being distracted. He had heard whispers that Shepard was alive and working with Cerberus, but he refused to believe it. He wasn’t sure if he wanted it to be true or not – if he’d rather Shepard be lost forever than working with an organization as shady and morally ambiguous as Cerberus. 

No, he’d rather Shepard was alive. He’d rather Shepard was anywhere, doing anything, than gone forever. 

It didn’t matter, though, even if the whispered rumors were true. The Collectors were the only enemy he could focus on, and the only thing he could was his job. So Kaidan committed himself to Horizon and its people, setting up the defense towers and coordinating with the Alliance to ensure their safety. They distrusted him, distrusted the entire Alliance and Council space, but that didn’t matter. Kaidan endured their silence and their coldness as well as he could. At the end of the day, they were doing good work, and that work was what mattered.

To say that he never thought of Shepard would be disingenuous. He thought of him constantly, to the point where he noticed more when he _wasn’t_ thinking of him than when he was. There was an absence to the consumption of his thoughts, an absolute disconnect between his mind and the rest of his body. He thought of Shepard, and he missed him, and he grieved for him, but it never seemed to touch the surface, to present itself in his words or his eyes or the work he was doing.

Kaidan reached out to Liara. He knew that she was an information broker, working on Illium, and if anyone knew about Shepard it would be her. Liara claimed to have no knowledge of Shepard, or whether the rumors of him being alive were even true. There was something about her voice though, secretive and distant, that Kaidan didn’t trust. She knew more than she was letting on, but Kaidan didn’t have the time or the energy to press her for information.

When the work was done and Kaidan was alone in his room with the entire night looming dark and endless in front of him, Kaidan became intensely aware of his thoughts. It was then that he realized how consumed by Shepard he was, how consumed he always would be. He thought of that last night together, his lips trembling against Shepard’s brow and his fingertips curled under his jaw. He thought of Shepard whispering, _I’m so damn sorry Kaidan_ , and he hated him for it. He hated him and he loved him and he wanted Shepard so badly it hurt him. 

Kaidan had told Shepard that it was okay; it was okay if he didn’t love him, it was okay if he pulled back, it was okay if he hid behind his walls of steel and refused to let anyone break him open. But it _wasn’t_ okay, and it never would be. It wasn’t okay that Kaidan was left with bittersweet memories and no idea if Shepard had ever cared about him at all. It wasn’t okay, it wasn’t fair, and whether it made him petulant or childish or not, that was the truth of it. 

The fact that Shepard might be alive, that he was alive somewhere out there and he hadn’t thought to contact Kaidan, only made things worse. What did it say about them if Shepard hadn’t thought of him? What did it say that Shepard was alive and he hadn’t thought of him _at all?_

 _Doesn’t love me as much as I love him_ , Kaidan thought. Bitter, cynical, jaded; not like himself at all. Shepard had always told him he had a good heart – a little too tender, a little too brittle, but a good heart all the same. And yet there he was, feeling more like a monster in human skin than anything else; feeling dark and miserable.

Experience had taught him that the best thing for a broken heart was work and an ample supply of alcohol. Seeing as how the people of Horizon tended to be disgustingly sober, Kaidan chose to pour himself into his work. Unlike before, he never took a moment to let his mind wander or drift; even into the night, he worked. He worked until his bones ached and his hands were cramped and stiff and his vision blurred. He worked until sleep took him. He let Shepard exist in his dreams.

For a while, that was enough, and then the Collectors came.

Kaidan didn’t remember much. He remembered seeing the strange creatures, insect-like and deceptively non-threatening, and then… darkness, stillness. When he came to he was the only one left, the only one the Collectors had decided to leave behind. He wasn’t sure why, or what they wanted, but it didn’t matter. He was alive and the others were gone and it was his job to see them returned safely, to see that the Collectors paid for what they did. 

And then he saw Shepard and nothing else mattered. For two years he had been consumed by anger, and bitterness, and a sorrow so expansive and intense he had felt crippled by it. But when he saw Shepard, everything else melted away; for a moment, or an eternity, it didn’t matter. Kaidan was drawn to him, as surely as he had ever been. Once more Shepard was the flame, and Kaidan was something small and helpless, gravitating towards him, crashing into him over and over again. 

Fortitude had always been his strongest skill, and yet when he looked at Shepard – when he saw him whole and strong and alive – he could barely keep his legs under him. Time was a tricky thing, always had been, and in that moment Kaidan understood what the worst thing about time was; the fact that you could get lost inside of it, that you could make it your bastion and your battalion, your shield and your sword, your saving grace and your worst curse. Kaidan had convinced himself for two years that what he needed was to move on, to let go, to pull himself up and dust himself off and set off for some new mission and some new sky. 

But what he needed – all that needed – was Shepard.

Another tricky thing about time was how skewed everything could become, how twisted and tangled and complicated. There was no telling if he existed in the past or the present when he stood in front of Shepard and let himself be pulled into his arms. He might have been older, harder, fractured and broken… or he might have been what he had been, younger and softer and filled with the idea that love was enough to save him, to save all of them.

He might have been both, caught between the man he had been and the man he was; or the man he could someday be. And that was the worst thing about time, really; it was fleeting and it was endless and Kaidan was trapped inside of it.

“Shepard,” Kaidan whispered. His name was a breath, strangled and relieved and as complicated as the throat that sighed it. He closed his eyes and lost himself to the feeling of Shepard’s arms around him. He let himself breathe in deeply, smelling Shepard’s skin and sweat and the burn of thermal clips. The same smell that had once been on _him_ , when Shepard had fucked him and kissed him and slept too close.

“Kaidan,” Shepard said. He sounded the same, choked and desperate. His arms held on too tightly, but Kaidan wasn’t complaining. With everything that had happened, Kaidan doubted he would have complained even if Shepard had been smothering him against his body.

It was easy to pretend for a little while that nothing had changed. Yet another trick of time, that he could be so instantly consumed by Shepard, that he could be so instantly in love with him all over again. Shepard’s breath touched his ear, soft and hot, and he whispered: “I missed you.”

Kaidan turned his face against Shepard’s throat, feeling his pulse under his lips, that sweet, vulnerable point Shepard had let him near so many times. He had trusted himself to Kaidan, for whatever it had been worth; he had trusted himself to Kaidan and there had been something for both of them to fight for.

Letting go had never been an option, and Kaidan could see that now. Shepard was as much a part of him as his own blood and bone, and there could never be any letting go of him. But too much had changed for them to pretend they were the same men they had once been; Kaidan had grown up and grown hard, Shepard had died and come back. There was too much distance between them.

So, Kaidan pulled away from him. It took every ounce of his strength and all of his will, but he managed to put some distance between them. When he did that, he was able to think a little clearer, to keep himself as professional as he needed to be. 

There was nothing more he wanted than to drown in Shepard, to never come up for air or admit any of the dark, painful things he had gone through since Shepard’s death. But he had a job to do, and so Kaidan said; “Tell me you’re not working for Cerberus.”

“I’m not working for Cerberus,” Shepard said. “They’re working for _me_.”

That was all it took to stoke the fire that had been dampened in his heart. Suddenly Kaidan was able to focus, to sharpen his claws and his teeth and do his job. Shepard might have turned his back on the Alliance, but Kaidan was with them until he died. Perhaps he knew a bit more about loyalty than _Commander_ Shepard.

Or perhaps he was still bitter. 

“I can’t even believe what I’m hearing,” Kaidan bit. “After everything we saw them do, after everything you know they’re capable of, you’re still working with them. That’s… Shepard, that’s crazy.”

“The Alliance wanted to sit this one out,” Shepard said. He bit back, just as impassioned and emboldened. It felt more like a boxing match, throwing punches that glanced off, pulling them at the last second, waiting for the perfect moment to go for the KO. Kaidan shouldn’t have been so excited by the tension and aggression, but he was. “They made that call, not me Kaidan. Cerberus gets results, and right now I don’t have the open for self-righteousness. I need to take down the Collectors, and Cerberus is the only operation giving me the resources and team to do that.”

For the first time, Kaidan noticed the people standing behind Shepard. The woman with her sleek black hair and piercing blue eyes was new, but he recognized Garrus immediately – even with half of his face wrecked with scars and healing flesh. 

“Garrus,” Kaidan said. “What the hell is Cerberus doing working with a Turian?”

“They needed the best,” Garrus said. “What can I say?”

“You can say this is some kind of joke,” Kaidan said. The threat and fire fled his voice, leaving him feeling cold. He sounded desperate, nothing more. “You can tell me you’re not working for a group of monsters.”

Garrus shifted uncomfortably. Good, let him be uncomfortable. 

“That’s not quite fair,” the woman said. “You have to understand that Cerberus is an expansive operation. We have cells all over Council space. What you encountered doesn’t begin to represent us.”

“Pardon me, ma’am,” Kaidan said. “But I know bullshit when I hear it.”

“You’re being willfully ignorant,” the woman bit. “Can’t you see---“

“It’s fine, Miranda,” Shepard interrupted. “Let it go.”

Miranda did, though begrudgingly. Kaidan could feel her eyes burrowing into him, hot and resentful, but he refused to look at her. 

“Tell me it’s not true,” Kaidan said, softly so only Shepard could hear him. “I want to hear you tell me it’s not true.”

“I’m still me, Kaidan,” Shepard said. “I’m still the same guy who kicked Saren’s ass and stopped the Reapers. I’m still the same guy you---“ He stopped, choosing his words carefully, still too afraid to tear himself open. “---You knew,” Shepard continued. “I’m trying to stop the Collectors, and that’s it. I don’t agree with Cerberus, I don’t support their actions, but they’re the only ones who are willing to get their hands dirty here. They’re the only ones working to end this.”

“You turned your back on the Alliance,” Kaidan spat. “On _me_.”

He felt petulant, stubborn, _infantile,_ but there was nothing he could do. Shepard was standing in front of him, alive and whole and so beautiful it made Kaidan’s heart ache, and he was telling him that he had left everything behind. He was telling him that he had moved on, that he had let go, that he had done a better job of those things dead than Kaidan had managed alive.

“I’m not going to sit here and justify myself to you, Kaidan,” Shepard said. “Believe what you want.”

After two years of wanting him and needing him and hating him and loving him so terribly it tore him to pieces, that was the end of it. _Believe what you want, it doesn’t matter._ Kaidan expected to feel a roiling wave of anger and grief, but the most he felt was a slight pang of loss and regret. Nothing that crippled him, or sent him to his knees; just a slight ache that lessened the longer he looked into Shepard’s eyes. 

They were the same eyes he’d fallen in love with and fallen into and gotten lost in, and that cemented the truth even more in Kaidan’s mind. There was no going back for them. There was no pretending left. The man in front of him was the same man who had fucked him and loved him, and that made it worse. He wasn’t being controlled, he wasn’t a puppet; everything he did was of his own choosing, his own free will, and there were no justifications for it. 

He had a job to do. Nothing else mattered. For once, they were of the same mind – the Collectors were all that mattered.

“Kaidan,” Shepard called when he turned to leave. Kaidan stopped, but he didn’t look back. If he looked at Shepard any longer he would go mad from it, so he kept his eyes forward and pretended they were stung with dust and wind instead of tears. 

“Take care of yourself,” Shepard said, lamely, like that was enough. Like anything would _ever_ be enough.

“You too, Commander,” Kaidan said.

He left with the dust still stinging his eyes.

**

“Were you close?” 

Shepard looked down into his glass of whiskey. He had long forgotten he even held it. The ice was melting, turning the strong amber liquid watery and opaque. 

Kelly asked the strangest questions, and at the most inopportune time. He wanted to tell her to leave him be, that he didn’t want to answer a million questions about Kaidan Alenko. That he wanted to keep everything like barbed wire around his heart and let the pain remind him that he’d gotten too close, too hot, too _involved._ He wanted to drink his diluted whiskey and lick his wounds.

She came with tenderness, however, and a heart far too tender and open. Because of that, Shepard shrugged and said: “We used to be.”

_Used to be…_

“I’m sorry,” Kelly said.

“Me too,” Shepard whispered.

**

“Mm, hormonal, probably. Common misconception that mood swings exist only in human females. Males, actually, display more aggravated shifts in mood because of hormonal fluctuations. Chest-pounding, bravado, bouts of self-pity. Suggest giving him space. Lots of space. _All_ of space if you prefer.”

“I didn’t come to discuss my love life, Mordin,” Shepard sighed.

“Of course,” Mordin said. “What did you need?”

He honestly didn’t even remember.

 

**

“Hates Cerberus, so he’s good with me,” Jack said. “But I could give a fuck about the Alliance. Sounds like your boyfriend needs to loosen up a little. Or grow a pair.”

“We should get drunk,” Kasumi suggested. “Really drunk. I have a good stock if you wanna swing by sometime, Shep.”

“Just kill a thresher maw and say you did it for him,” Grunt, well, grunted. 

“Do I look like a goddamn couple’s therapist?” Zaeed asked, looking at Shepard with his sharp, unnatural eyes until Shepard gave up and left.

Surprisingly, Miranda provided the best advice, and she did so without him having to dance around the subject and drag it out of her. She looked at him, closely and intensely, offering him no luxury of escape, and said: “I could tell he meant something to you back on Horizon. In my experience it’s never a good idea to mix your personal and professional life, but… If he’s important to you, Shepard, make some kind of peace with him.”

So that night, with a mug of coffee close at hand, Shepard sat down at his console and made some kind of peace. It wasn’t difficult really, all he had to do was tear his chest open and reveal every fragile part of himself. Nothing above his paygrade. Nothing that the savior of the Citadel and first human spectre couldn’t handle.

TO: SCDR ALENKO, K.  
FROM: CDR SHEPARD, J.  
SUBJECT: [BLANK]

_Kaidan,_

_Been sitting here for a while now thinking of what to say. Maybe there isn’t anything to say at all, maybe there’s nothing left to talk about. But, Kaidan… I miss you. With everything that’s happened that probably sounds pretty pathetic, and it’s probably not enough, but it’s true. I miss you, and I’m thinking about you._

_I should have tracked you down as soon as I was back. I should have found you and let you know everything. You’ve been a hell of a good friend to me, Kaidan, and you’ve always had my back and trusted me to have yours. I let you down and I’m sorry._

_The thing is… I know how we left things. How I left them. You never held back, and it scared the hell out of me to be with someone who was so damn unafraid to love me. Pretty cowardly from the first human spectre, but there’s the truth; I was too scared to love you, so I pulled back._

_I’m so damn sorry, Kaidan. About everything. About how it ended and how we left it, on the Normandy and Horizon. I just want you to be okay. It doesn’t matter if you forgive me, or if you understand why I’m doing what I’m doing, just… Please just be okay, Kaidan._

_With love,_

Shepard stopped. He looked at the words, _with love_ , with a distinct feeling of dread. Could he be that vulnerable? Could he _afford_ to?

Could he afford not to?

Shepard deleted the words and typed:

_Yours,_

_Shepard_

**

_Shepard,_

_I’ll be okay. I’ll try my best to be okay, I mean. I don’t think anything’s guaranteed for any of us, especially not with what’s going on now. I just really need you to be straight with me. I need to know Cerberus isn’t behind all this. I need to know I can still trust you, that you’re still the same man I---_

No. He wouldn’t make it about Cerberus. He wouldn’t make it about the Collectors. If he did that, everything they’d had together would be done. He’d work through his trust issues on his own time. It’d taken a lot of courage for Shepard to reach out to him the way he had, Kaidan wouldn’t denigrate it by needling him for answers.

Kaidan took a deep breath and started over.

_I’ll be okay. I’ll try my best to be okay, I mean. I don’t think anything’s guaranteed for any of us, especially not with what’s going on now. Be safe, Shepard. I’m thinking of you out there somewhere, kicking ass and taking names, and I feel a hell of a lot safer. I want the same for you, that’s all._

_I love you,_

_Kaidan_

A little voice at the back of his mind told him that he should change that, that he shouldn’t leave the words there, so bald and honest and vulnerable. He might as well have reached inside of himself and smeared his heart across the message. 

_Don’t come up for air._

Kaidan closed his eyes and hit send.

**

“I have lived and loved and lost,” Thane said. “That hardest of those things is the losing. Better to speak and be cut open than remain silent and never feel anything at all.”

“And if I’m setting us both up for a lot of disappointment later on?” Shepard asked. “What am I supposed to do then? I don’t have the luxury of falling in love.”

Thane smiled, that infinitely patient smile of his, and leaned forward on his elbows, steepling his fingers under his chin. “None of us do,” he said. “Do you think yourself so integral to the survival of the galaxy that you would deny yourself happiness? Or are you simply afraid of loving another person?”

Blunt, cool, deceptively cruel. Whenever Thane said anything it sounded so eloquent and poetic, even when it stung like acid. Perhaps it hurt more because it was so close to the truth, so near the heart of the problem.

“That’s not really fair,” Shepard said. “I just… There’s no time---“

“Shepard, who are you trying to convince?” Thane asked. “If you do not want to be with him, tell him that. Otherwise… Life is short, and chances at happiness are few and far between. Either live and love and lose, or do not.”

 

**

Living in the twenty-second century, a person might have assumed communication would have been flawless, but Shepard and Kaidan could hardly hear one another over their Omni-tools with the crackle of static. Even still, they spent hours chatting, seamlessly wending their way from topic to topic, neither of them lighting on the areas of conversation they knew would cause tension. Shepard never mentioned Cerberus, and Kaidan never asked; it was an uneasy agreement, to let those things remain in silence, and it wasn’t something Shepard was entirely comfortable with; he remembered being able to talk with Kaidan about anything and everything, he remembered him being open and warm and free of judgment.

Things had changed. But the one thing that _hadn’t_ was how easily Kaidan could tie him into knots. The slight catch in his breath, the way he stumbled awkwardly and adorably over the simplest words like his tongue had swelled too big for his mouth, the way he sounded when he laughed; that good, deep laugh that came from his stomach and made his eyes crinkle; all of those things still made Shepard’s heart pound and his pulse race and his palms sweaty. 

_Can’t get enough of you,_ Shepard thought. He couldn’t quite bring himself to say the words, couldn’t quite drag them out of his stubborn throat. 

“I was sitting here thinking about Eden Prime,” Kaidan said. “Just… thinking about what we saw there, and how we had no idea what we were getting ourselves into. Ah, thinking about the beacon. How you pulled me back.”

“Yeah, hey,” Shepard murmured. “No problem.”

“You were always pulling me back,” Kaidan whispered. “Always… Looking out for me, even when you didn’t need to. I guess I thought you’d always be there to drag me away from the edge, and when you weren’t, I…”

“Kaidan---“

“I was lost without you,” Kaidan said. 

The words hurt, in a sweet-painful way Shepard couldn’t describe. His throat felt too tight, his eyes burned, his chest ached. Again, he was in knots, tangled up, and Kaidan was to blame. 

_Either live and love and lose or do not._

“Kaidan, I just… I really need you to listen to me, okay?”

Silence. Shepard could only assume he was listening and the connection hadn’t been broken. Thinking of Kaidan so far away from him, drowning himself in hurt and anger and grief was almost more than Shepard could bear. He wondered how Kaidan had felt when he’d learned of his death, how he’d probably stood there at Shepard’s ‘funeral’ with his dress blues on and his jaw set and his eyes dry. How he’d cried all alone in the dark, in a bed that was suddenly too cold, with a _heart_ that was suddenly too cold…

“I made a lot of mistakes, okay? I mean I did a lot of stupid shit when I was growing up, when I first started out with the Alliance, even when I made Commander. I always thought that I had myself pretty much in order, that I had my shit together. Until you walked in and reminded me that I was just a little boy, putting on my uniform and playing soldier.”

More silence. Shepard plowed ahead. He couldn’t stop, couldn’t make himself hold back any longer. If he didn’t get everything out of him he was sure it would kill him, grow like a cancer under his ribs and he’d never be able to cut it out.

“I looked at you and I saw a guy who had everything figured out,” Shepard continued. “Maybe that wasn’t the truth of it, but that’s what I saw. You were tough, but fair, you were strong but soft, you just had this… _have_ this energy about you that’s so goddamn compelling and magnetic. I envied the hell out of you, Kaidan, I really did. I envied the way you could carve your heart out and expose yourself like it was nothing, like it was just a part of putting on the uniform.”

Shepard took a breath and paused for a few heartbeats before continuing, in a rush: “The closer I got to you, the more I realized you’re not all that put together, and you don’t have everything figured out. You get lost, Kaidan, and you need someone to take care of you. It took me a long time to realize that’s not a weakness. That’s not… That’s not a bad thing. Because I need someone to take care of me, too. Someone who’s gonna be there when the dust settles and the lights go out. Someone who’s got my back, no matter what. Someone---“

“Shepard,” Kaidan said.

“Let me,” Shepard whispered. “Just let me, okay?”

“Okay, yeah,” Kaidan said. “Yeah.”

“Someone who loves me,” Shepard said. “I’m sick and tired of pretending there’s no time, that I don’t need that in my life, that I’m not made of skin and I don’t bleed and I don’t hurt and I don’t fucking _need_. Kaidan, I’m sick and tired of pretending that I don’t love you.”

Silence, unbearable this time. Shepard wanted to make sure he was still there, to speak until Kaidan shut him up, but he stopped himself. He waited, feeling sweat bead at his temples and run stinging into his eye. 

Kaidan said his name, sly and sexy. Shepard swallowed, not hearing what he said after the throaty purr of his name.

“Huh?”

“Say it again,” Kaidan whispered. “You wanna do that for me, Commander?”

Shepard’s heart fluttered. God, he felt like a teenager again, clumsy and breathless and shamefully hard. “I love you,” Shepard said. He wanted to sound strong, suave, maybe a little flirty, but instead he sounded hoarse and desperate. “I love you, Kaidan.”

The words, _too little too late_ , echoed through his head, but Shepard ignored them. He wanted to exist in that moment forever, with Kaidan’s voice warm and sweet and his own body trembling. He wanted the words to be good enough, for one night. All he wanted was to believe that they were enough, that he and Kaidan would be okay.

For a while that was what he had, what they had _together,_ and it was the sweetest thing he’d ever known.


	4. Through the Storm

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> He was sick of soldiering on; sick and tired. He wanted to rest. He wanted to feel the rush of adrenaline all over again when Kaidan straddled his hips and kissed his mouth raw and pinned his hands above his head and made him _fragile._ Shepard wanted to feel the rush of just being with him, being still and being together and being okay.

**Chapter Four**

Drifting.

Ethereal shapes moved in his periphery; there and gone. When he tried to find them, they disappeared into vapor, leaving nothing behind except for a whisper he couldn’t understand. 

He tried to run in the darkness, but there was resistance. Shepard felt like he was pushing against a stone wall, desperately trying to gain some momentum, to be free of the darkness and the drifting shapes, and the ceaseless whispers. A dream, he told himself. Just a dream, nothing to be scared of. But he _was_ scared, _terrified_ , and if it was a dream he wanted to wake up, he wanted to be gone from the place.

There was a lack of air, a lack of color, a lack of vibrancy and life. He could recall a time when he had seen a place like the one he was in, when he had been young and the world had been cold and hard, dreary and hopeless. The sky the color of steel, a concrete jungle with wildlings that wanted to tear him apart. The only sharpness had been of blood, of the burn of thermal clips and the soaring heat in his veins. 

No, he wouldn’t go back there. He _couldn’t_. If he found himself back there he would go mad from it, he would _die_.

Shepard screamed but there was no sound. Spaced again, then. Left to exist in the ether and the cosmos as his lungs collapsed and his skin burned from the cold. 

Not again, never again. The same way he refused the city with its drabness and its violence, he refused the idea that he was dying all over again, that everything had been for nothing. Strangely, and perhaps wonderfully, he thought of Kaidan. He thought of Kaidan standing on Horizon with his dark eyes mistrustful and his lips trembling with an emotion he was too choked or too proud or too stubborn to say.

That centered him, gave him life, allowed him to shove against the steel wall separating him from dream and reality and he was---

In his bed, sweating and panting and _cold_.

He made a noise, something small and shameful, and scrubbed his hand over his face. 

Shepard got out of bed, too wound up, too much adrenaline in his veins to lie still. He wandered to the window and looked out over the compound, absently stroking his hands over his own bicep, desperate for warmth and contact. 

For a moment, he was confused about where he was and what he was doing there. He could have sworn he had a war to fight, an enemy beyond all imagination and comprehension to deal with. More than anything he could have sworn he had friends who needed him, a lover who _wanted_ him, and a life that he had to get back to. 

Alliance Headquarters; Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada. 

Earth.

Right, how could he have forgotten? The Alpha Relay, Dr. Kenson, indoctrination and Reapers and a bunch of dead Batarians. 

They wanted a convenient scapegoat, someone they could point to and accuse of vast amounts of treason and genocide. Anything, Shepard guessed, that would keep them from focusing on the real threat looming in front of them. No one there wanted to believe the Reapers were real, or that they were _coming_ and there was nothing they could do but grit their teeth and survive. The Alliance was no different from the Council; plugging their ears and shutting their eyes and ignoring everything and everyone that tried to warn them.

And, by some small measure of conscience and fragile humanity, Shepard didn’t disagree with them on the charges they were bringing against them. What he’d done had been abhorrent. At the least it had been unconscionable, and at the worst… immoral, inhuman, _monstrous._ War had shaped him, however, and the Alliance had been his whetstone, honing him into the man he was. He made no excuses for himself; he had slaughtered over three hundred thousand Batarians and every day he carried the guilt and the horror of that.

But he had saved trillions of lives in the process, and at the end of the day, the arguments against him didn’t matter. They could argue over hundreds of thousands of corpses when the Reapers were dealt with; or they could stand in the trillions of dead and ask themselves if their consciences were clean. 

Necessary; that was the word Shepard kept telling himself. After a while, he could almost look at himself in the mirror again without hating the man he saw. He could almost forgive himself.

There was a knock at his door. Shepard glanced at the time, saw it was nearly three in the morning, and frowned. Who could be coming to see him so late? Anderson wouldn’t bother, unless something terrible had happened, and no one else was allowed to speak with him save for---

“Yeah,” Shepard called. “Come on in.”

It was Vega. 

The first time Shepard had met the man, James Vega had seemed little more than a star struck little boy. He had told Shepard, in a rushed, breathless voice, how much he admired him, how he had watched him become the first human spectre, how he had followed his career over the years and thought he was the finest soldier the galaxy had ever seen. Over time, though, the adoration and adulation had faded, and things had become natural. They played poker and laughed over stupid, inappropriate jokes. They drank cheap beer and swapped war stories like a couple of old soldiers, even if Vega wasn’t yet out of his second decade.

Shepard liked him; that was the long and short of it. He liked Vega’s wit and charm and style. He liked that when he talked with him he felt like a soldier again; just an old soldier telling his stories. Commander Shepard, first human spectre, savior of the Citadel and destroyer of the Collectors… It was too fanciful for him, too large and confusing, too _grandiose._ He preferred being nothing but John Shepard, Alliance Navy, flesh and bone and no legend.

“What’d you need, James?”

“Makin’ sure you were alright,” James said. “Heard… something.”

He looked uncomfortable. Probably he’d heard the noises Shepard had made in his sleep, and most likely they had been weak noises, plaintive and desperate and terribly vulnerable.

“I’m fine,” Shepard said. “Just… some bad dreams, you know. Nothing serious.”

James looked relieved. He also looked _curious_ , which caught Shepard off-guard. Up until that moment James had seemed relaxed, always at ease, never curious about much except for what beer he could sneak in and how far he could bend the rules without breaking them. Shepard was reminded that James was a lot younger than him in that moment; he wanted to know more, but he couldn’t bring himself to come out and _ask_. It wasn’t a lack of courage, it was too much protocol and regulation blocking his throat. 

“Bad ones,” Shepard said. He moved to the table where he and James had played cards and drank beer too many times to count and sat down. Shepard looked at James until the kid flushed and sat down across from him. It never failed to amaze Shepard how someone could be so big -- broad-shouldered and thickly muscled and larger than a lot of mountains – and still remain so small. James looked like a little boy, leaned over with his elbows on his knees and his head down. Shepard might have been a little irritated with his refusal to meet his eyes if he hadn’t found it so endearing.

“You ever dream you were trying to run but you couldn’t?” Shepard asked. The question was odd, and he knew it, but he was frankly _curious_ , and that in itself surprised him so much that he had to ask. 

“No,” James said. “Sometimes I dream I’m on a beach surrounded by super models.”

Shepard laughed. “Why can’t I have _that_ dream? I’d trade you, Vega.”

“’Ey, bad dreams go with the territory. After everything you did, I mean… everything that happened and---“

“I killed them all,” Shepard said. “And I didn’t even hesitate. The Reapers were coming and it was three hundred thousand versus trillions of lives. I made the call, and it was a rough one to make, but it was the _right one_. War is all about cruel math. I didn’t know that when I was your age, Vega… But I learned.”

“Yeah,” Vega said. He was uncomfortable, Shepard could tell. He didn’t want to discuss heartless arithmetic and the measuring of lives and how soldiers sometimes had to play God. He wanted to talk about dreams, and that weird click in Shepard’s throat when he was too close to tearing himself open. Or maybe he wanted to talk about his favorite team in biotiball, or his old girlfriends, or the Krogan friend the last place he’d been stationed.

Maybe he wanted to be young, and maybe Shepard couldn’t let him.

It was late and he was exhausted. Shepard said good night, stiffly, and James looked at him with those eyes that somehow, even after everything he’d seen and done and gone through, _got to him_. Because they were young, and hurt, and disillusioned, and Shepard didn’t have the patience and James didn’t have the words.

He let it be and said good night again. 

James left him to the darkness and the quiet. To the ethereal shapes at his periphery and the knowledge that everything was ephemeral; time, life, love, hope… It was worn away under the tide of war and the red shadow of violence. If he’d been stronger, he might have told James he was lucky to be young, lucky to laugh and love and open his chest up to let someone crawl inside.

But Shepard wasn’t as strong as he thought.

He crawled into bed and closed his eyes.

**

For six months, Kaidan had waited for word from Shepard. When no word had come, he reached out to Anderson. He was told to arrive at HQ with his dress blues on and his medals pinned to his chest, and he was met outside the compound with rain slicing against his face and his collar soaked.

“Good to see you, Major,” Anderson said. He shook Kaidan’s hand firmly, his palm warm and dry. Kaidan looked into his eyes and he knew everything. It wasn’t some kind of sixth sense of psychic ability, the truth was written all over Anderson’s face, carved deep in the lines around his eyes and mouth. The Reapers were coming and they weren’t ready.

“You too, sir,” Kaidan said. He was a bit thrown off by the handshake, the cordiality and familiarity of it. By-the-books was his lifeblood, and if he’d had the option, he would have saluted Anderson and addressed him as ‘sir’. Anderson was every bit a soldier’s soldier, though, and he had thrown out the book of rules a long time before. In any event, Kaidan didn’t dislike the familiarity and companionable ease of Anderson’s attitude; he was a little overwhelmed actually.

Anderson had been his Commander, once upon a time, before Saren and the geth and the Reapers, before Shepard had been given the Normandy in his campaign against unimaginable odds. Kaidan couldn’t quite shake the feeling that he was doing something wrong, so when Anderson dropped his hand, Kaidan saluted him.

He laughed, and it brightened his eyes and cleared away shadows. Kaidan smiled, keeping his back stiff but letting his hand drop to his side. “You look like hell, sir,” Kaidan said.

“ _Feel_ like hell, Alenko,” Anderson said. “Come on, let’s get inside before we freeze to death.”

He’d always admired the compound for its simplicity. Everything was symmetrical, sharp lines and towering columns. Utilitarian and neat as could be. It appealed to Kaidan; which Shepard would have said just proved Kaidan needed to loosen up a little. 

As they walked through the halls, Kaidan asked about him. He tried to be as casual as possible, but Anderson knew his concern was more than friendly. Didn’t seem to _care_ , though, which was a relief; the last thing Kaidan needed was someone who gave a damn about the rules of fraternization.

“Doing good,” Anderson said. “Good as he can with the situation he’s in. It’s a shame what they’re doing to him, what they’re putting him through. Like he doesn’t know what blood he has on his hands.”

“Like the Reapers aren’t coming,” Kaidan said. 

Anderson stopped and looked at him. His eyes were weary but still just as intense. Kaidan felt the urge to look away, to lower his eyes to his boots, but he resisted. Anderson had always been good to him, and more than that, he’d always been straight with him; there was no need to look away like some rookie still wet behind the ears.

“Right,” Anderson said. “Like they’re just some myth Shepard invented to take the heat off. Goddammit, we need to move.”

“Whatever you need, sir,” Kaidan said. “Just say the word.”

Anderson smiled. “Thank you for the loyalty, Major, but I’m not about to send you out on your own scouting for Reapers.”

“No, sir, I appreciate that.”

Anderson led him down a few more corridors, the only sound their shoes clicking on the polished floor. He stopped in front of a door, punching in a number into the keypad quickly. The door slid open, and Kaidan looked inside. A bed, a table, two chairs, a large window that looked out over the front of the headquarters, a vid screen that dominated the far wall, and a minibar – which seemed a bit out of place.

“If you need anything, let me know,” Anderson said.

“Actually, sir, I wanted to speak with Shepard.”

Anderson nodded, looking away from Kaidan. “That’s… a little complicated. For all intents and purposes this is a court martial. No visitors allowed.”

Kaidan felt a strong urge to argue. Shepard had done what was necessary, he had done what any good soldier would do, and he’d saved the galaxy in the process. But Anderson knew all of that. Kaidan wanted to appeal to his feelings of friendship and camaraderie, but he knew that was a lost cause. On the subject of being ushered into the headquarters, Kaidan was a friend, but when it came to deliberately disobeying Alliance command… Anderson’s hands were tied. And at the end of the day, Anderson was an Admiral and Kaidan was his subordinate. There was nothing he could do.

“You’ll see him soon enough,” Anderson said. “They won’t keep him waiting too much longer.”

Anderson shook his hand again before he left. Kaidan still didn’t know how to feel about that, but it was fine. He didn’t know how to feel about _anything._ Shepard’s trial, the Reapers, the inaction of the Alliance and the Council, the Alpha Relay and Batarian colony, Horizon and everything else…

He stepped into the room and wandered around aimlessly for a while. He turned on the vid screen and let the news play in the background, toying with his dog tags and staring listlessly out the window. Raindrops spotted the window and fog made everything outside seem like a hazy dream. Kaidan was used to the weather, to the chill and the rain and the fog that rolled in from the bay. He was home, for better or for worse, and he had never felt so foreign, so lost.

 _Shepard,_ Kaidan thought. _Jesus, this is a mess._

Shepard had told him he loved him. His voice had been filled with static, but Kaidan had heard him, had _believed_ him. And now there he was, six months later and still getting static, still waiting for everything to be clear.

The minibar wasn’t so out of place, after all.

**

“Hey, LT.”

Kaidan smiled. Two years since his promotion and Ashley still refused to address him by his actual rank. Kaidan turned to her and found her in his arms, her lips pressed against his jaw, warm and dry and a little too brief. 

Her hair was loose and touched her shoulders, most likely to cover up her large, awkward ears. Kaidan smirked, letting himself get lost in the familiarity of her, in the warmth of her. She was unaffected and uncomplicated, and that was what Kaidan needed; he needed a friend he could lose himself in for a little while.

“Here to see Skipper?” Ashley asked.

“Yeah,” Kaidan said. “Not that it matters.”

“I hear that,” Ashley said. “I respect the chain of command, you know that, but this? This is bullshit. Shepard’s being railroaded.”

 _Worked with Cerberus_ , Kaidan thought. _Worked with the enemy. Maybe he was compromised. Maybe he made a mistake. Maybe the Illusive Man pulled his strings the whole time._

The thought made him sick; not because there was any merit to it, but because he could think something like that just showed him how truly distrustful he was. He wanted things clear, free of static, but the static was his own. He was trapped inside of it, trying to make sense of everything, and the suspicion and the distrust were killing him.

“He’s supposed to be here soo--- There he is.”

Kaidan looked, and there he was, rounding the corner with Anderson leading him and James behind him. He looked good, better than Kaidan was expecting. A sense of déjà vu descended; he had experienced the same feeling when he’d seen Shepard on Horizon, only this was far less intense. Shepard wasn’t back from the dead, he was only out of confinement. Still, Kaidan liked the way he walked, the way he kept his head up and his eyes forward and his shoulders back. He looked _good_ , and that was all that mattered.

“Kick some ass, Skipper,” Ashley said. Shepard smiled at her. There had been tension between the two of them, as well, Kaidan had heard, but they seemed to have sorted things out. It was always easier when things weren’t so complicated, so bound up in hurt feelings and broken hearts and broken trust and aching, pulsing _want_. 

“Shepard,” Kaidan said.

“Major Alenko,” Anderson greeted.

“Major?” Shepard asked.

“Yeah,” Kaidan said. “Guess you’re a little out of the loop nowadays.”

Shepard chuckled. “Guess so. I hadn’t heard. Congratulations.”

“Yeah,” Kaidan said. “Shepard---“

Anderson moved past him, and Shepard followed. Kaidan wanted to reach out to him, grab him and pull him back, make him stand still for one goddamn minute so he could clear away the static, but Shepard was gone and Kaidan stood there with his hands in his pockets.

“You know the Commander?” James asked.

“I used to,” Kaidan said.

**

 

When he saw Shepard next, he was pulling him onto the Normandy as Vancouver burned and screamed around them. “Welcome aboard, Shepard,” Kaidan said, because it was all he _could_ say. Ashley and James were right behind him, and it wasn’t exactly the right moment to ask for a heart-to-heart. He seriously doubted there would _ever_ be a right moment.

“Thanks,” Shepard said. 

Because it was all _he_ could say, too.

**

You never questioned the chain of command, but even Shepard had to wonder what they could possibly find on Mars that would be worth the trip. The Reapers were on _Earth_. That’s where they should have been, fighting and maybe dying, but saving as many people as they could.

Anderson was right, though; the war would be everywhere soon enough. Without the Council’s help, there would be no chance of winning. Shepard had no intention of dying quietly, but he also had no intention of losing when they could have a chance at victory; if he returned to Earth, that would be exactly what happened. They’d lose, and the Reapers would turn them into nothing more than fodder for their next abomination.

“What does he think we’ll find on Mars?” Kaidan asked.

“I don’t know,” Shepard said. “But it’s something worth looking into.”

“He said something about Liara---“

“We’ll find her,” Shepard said. “Let’s go.”

**

The same old conversation, the same old bitterness, the same old eyes looking at him like he was a stranger, or worse, an enemy. Shepard wanted to feel indignant, he wanted to be angry, but he was honestly only tired. 

“Believe what you want,” he told Kaidan. “I’m done trying to convince you. We clear, Major?”

The way Kaidan looked at him, like Shepard had just kicked him in the heart, hurt him. But he was honestly too tired to care much. Kaidan had hurt him first. That didn’t make it right, or fair, but it did make it easier to handle.

“Yeah,” Kaidan said. “I get it.”

**

Apathy was a strange feeling. Shepard had never enjoyed it, never wanted to reach the point where cynicism wore him down to the bone and everything was simply… _nothing._ So when Kaidan fell, and he felt that hot surge of painful love for him, painful fear for him, he was almost glad. Not that Kaidan was hurt, but because he wasn’t broken, he wasn’t lost.

Shepard lifted him into his arms, feeling the weight of him, feeling how he moved almost bonelessly in his arms, as though the woman had broken him apart, had turned him to water and dust. Shepard closed his eyes and held Kaidan tight against him, whispering his name like that would be enough to wake him, or to save him.

“Hold on, Kaidan.”

 

**

Letting go of Kaidan was the hardest thing Shepard had ever done. More difficult than any enemy he had faced, more painful than destroying three hundred thousand Batarian lives. He trusted Kaidan to the care of the doctors, but they were forced to pry him from Shepard’s arms, to hold him back when he attempted to follow after them.

When he turned around, James was there. Still with those young eyes of his that looked straight through Shepard and forced him to be naked. 

“He gonna be okay?” James asked.

Shepard shoved past him. How the hell was he supposed to know? What the hell was he supposed to _do_?

 _Soldier on_ , a little voice at the back of his mind whispered. Strange, he’d heard the words before, had told them to himself when he needed a boost in morale… but he’d never realized how cold they sounded. 

Bailey met him, told him the Council was expecting him. 

Shepard soldiered on.

**

“He’s strong,” Liara said. “He’ll be okay.”

Shepard knew a platitude when he heard one. Nevertheless, he wrapped himself in her words and let them be of whatever comfort they could. He wrapped his damaged heart up and tried to believe her. 

**

“Ash brought me that,” Kaidan said. His voice was hoarse and thick, his face cut and bruised, but he was sitting up and smiling, and Shepard guessed that was enough.

Shepard looked at the coffee mug in his hands and smiled.

“Galaxy’s #1 Lieutenant,” Shepard chuckled.

“Yeah,” Kaidan said. “She has no respect for rank.”

The silence between them, for once, was comfortable. Shepard reached out and took Kaidan’s hand, and Kaidan’s smile widened, became almost too sweet for Shepard to look at. Still, he didn’t look away. He stroked his thumb over Kaidan’s knuckles and looked into his eyes. He waited for one of them to say something, _anything_ , to find an absolution or make an excuse. 

They were both too tired, too beaten down, to make an attempt. They had danced the same dance before, and the steps were stilted and growing outdated. Shepard wanted to make a fresh start, to wipe the slate clean and see what they could do. He wanted to tell Kaidan he loved him, he’d always loved him, he always would, but he could only stroke his knuckles and stare into his eyes and hope for Kaidan to break the silence. 

“I was stupid,” Kaidan said.

Shepard squeezed his hand absently. He didn’t refute what he said, he didn’t agree with him. He sat there quietly and waited for Kaidan to work through whatever he needed to work through. 

“I just… I got so caught up in what happened with Cerberus that I forgot what kind of guy you are. I’m just… ah, I’m just sorry, Shepard. I just felt like you… betrayed me, I guess. Which is stupid. You’d never do that, and you’d never turn your back on the Alliance or---“ Kaidan sighed and leaned his head back. “I’m so damn sorry, Shepard.”

The same words Shepard had told him, lying cradled against his body in the darkness, with the universe sitting on his shoulders and everything pressing heavy on his chest. The irony wasn’t lost on Shepard, and it shouldn’t have been lost on Kaidan. After everything they’d gone through and everything they’d done, they were still too damn sorry to even look at one another.

“It’s okay, Kaidan,” Shepard said. Not because he felt obligated to assuage his guilt and fear, and not because he believed it was what Kaidan needed to hear; it was simply _okay._ They’d hurt one another -- out of anger or spite or because they were too in love to know how to move together, how to collide without breaking one another --- and it was okay.

“I just wanna know we’re good,” Kaidan said. “That’s all, Shepard. Just… are we _good?_ ”

Shepard thought of Kaidan in the night, warm and soft, his fingertips tracing the lush hair under his navel, his knee pressed between his thighs. For so long Shepard had convinced himself that he needed to drown himself in work. He needed to avoid the topic of love and need and want and craving so that he could stay focused and do what needed to be done. For so long he had pushed the memory of Kaidan sweet and vulnerable and naked and damp with sweat from his mind because there was nothing he could do about it, there was nothing he could do but _soldier on_.

He was sick of soldiering on; sick and tired. He wanted to rest. He wanted to feel the rush of adrenaline all over again when Kaidan straddled his hips and kissed his mouth raw and pinned his hands above his head and made him _fragile._ Shepard wanted to feel the rush of just being with him, being still and being together and being okay.

“We’re good, Kaidan,” Shepard said. “We’re good.”

**

His hands were still shaking.

“Never thought you’d turn your gun on me,” Shepard said. The words came in a rush, not quite a laugh, and he looked at Kaidan desperately, like he expected an apology.

Kaidan didn’t apologize. But he rationalized, and Shepard figured that meant he was processing things, dealing with them the only way he knew how. _Sometimes the way something goes down does matter_ , Kaidan had said, and Shepard was willing to agree with him. But at the same time, they were alive, and edging closer, and the old familiar heat was there, as strong and startling as ever. 

What they both wanted didn’t matter. What they needed… That was another matter altogether. They wanted closeness, heat, electricity, fire in their stomachs. That’s exactly what they got. There was no room left for dancing, for spinning around the subject, from resisting the magnetism between them. Shepard kissed Kaidan, roughly, his tongue flicking against his teeth, and Kaidan whispered his name.

Quick, hot, desperate; Shepard didn’t much care _how_ they fucked or _how_ they melted together, he just needed Kaidan inside of him, in his blood and straight to his head like a drug, or a bullet, or something dangerous and uninhibited.

Kaidan laughed when Shepard kissed his throat. He threw his arms around Shepard’s neck and let himself be lifted. Like three years earlier when Shepard had hoisted him into his arms and the whole beautiful mess had started. Kaidan surrendered himself to it, to the passion and the wildness and everything beyond his control. He surrendered himself to _Shepard_ , and if there was a better way to prove his trust, Kaidan didn’t know what it could be. He laid there with his thighs spread and his head tipped back and his throat exposed, and he never trembled when Shepard pushed into him, or bit the flesh over his pulse, or dragged his nails over his thighs.

Trust wasn’t that fragile, really. Not when you’d rebuilt it and reinforced it. If the foundation shook, it was fine, Kaidan had faith now and it was what he held onto.

After, in the dark, with the sweat cooling on their skin, Shepard said: “I love you, Kaidan.”

“Could you say that again, Commander?”

Shepard grinned, turning his face to brush his nose over Kaidan’s temple and his lips against his ear. “I love you,” he said.

Kaidan met his eyes. No room left for guilt or shame or distrust or sharp questions that dug in cruelly like knives. Only room now for their bodies, pressed tight together, and to tie their tongues into bows.

“I love you too,” Kaidan whispered. 

The darkness seemed to sigh around them. 

**

Kaidan found him sitting in the dark with his head in his hands. The only light was the blue glow of the aquarium and the slight illumination from the data pad sitting in front of him.

He stepped closer, the glasses clinking softly in his hands, the bottle of wine cold against his palm. Shepard looked up, and Kaidan was scared to see how tired he looked, how defeated, how utterly and terribly _small._

Shepard smiled and banished the shadows from his face, and Kaidan smiled back. He held out the glasses and raised an eyebrow playfully. “Just a quick drink and then I’ll go,” he said. They both knew it was a lie, but neither of them cared much. They drank and talked for what felt like hours, and Kaidan shifted closer against Shepard’s heat. He pressed his lips to Shepard’s jaw, kissed up to his ear.

“I lied,” Kaidan whispered. 

Shepard kissed him, slowly, exploratory, trying to map and chart the shape of Kaidan’s mouth with his tongue, to file it to memory. Kaidan had been kissed plenty of times, by Shepard and people before him, but he couldn’t remember a kiss ever being so deep, so powerful, so achingly sweet. 

He mounted Shepard’s hips, keeping their mouths sealed together, letting his tongue roll and caress Shepard’s. It was slow, gentle, ineffably and infuriatingly tender. Not like the first time where it had been all heat and panted breath and slick thighs thrown over slicker hips. That time the sex was patient, breathless, laughing and twisting together, moving to the bed when the couch was too small to collapse and tangle all over again.

Kaidan’s nails left imprints on Shepard’s back. Shepard’s fingers left imprints on Kaidan’s hips. Maybe all that they had done was cling to one another when the storm had started, desperate for shelter and some kind of safe haven. But in the end, that was all anyone ever did, that was all you _could_ do when the rain started and the wind howled. 

They tattooed one another with bruises and bites and breath. They left their shape on one another’s bodies, and hearts, and when Kaidan laid there trembling with Shepard still caught between his legs, he knew what it meant to love someone. Nothing had prepared him for the truth of it, the all-encompassing and painful truth: you loved everything. You loved the way they smiled and the way they laughed and the way they stood in the darkness with nothing but their hunger to keep them going. You loved the shadows, even when they were frightening, and you loved the bitterness of them, the sweetness and everything in-between. 

Kaidan whispered: “I love you.”

Shepard whispered back, his voice lost in Kaidan’s throat, his breath hot enough to burn.

 

**

“We both know this is goodbye.”

Shepard stepped close, his hand at the small of Kaidan’s back, his lips close to Kaidan’s mouth. He didn’t say a word, but he kissed with enough power and enough conviction and enough burning intensity to make words seem entirely useless. 

Kaidan held onto him tightly, not willing to ever let go, not willing to ever admit that he might never see him again, he might never be kissed by him or held by him or dragged down into heated darkness with him. Desperately, he thought of Shepard their first night together, laughing as he poured whiskey, his smile fading when Kaidan’s fingers brushed over his knuckles and Kaidan’s lips framed his own.

He’d been trembling then, and he was trembling now. Sometimes that was alright. Sometimes that was all you could do. Tremble in the darkness and be small and scared and human.

“I’m gonna fight like hell for the chance to hold you again,” Kaidan whispered. He moved his face against Shepard’s throat, felt the beat of his pulse under his mouth, and he closed his eyes. He existed with him in the darkness for a while, and it wasn’t good enough, but it was all they had left.

**

Brightness.

He couldn’t clear his eyes. Everything was white-hot. The pain, the light, the shift of his bones under his skin. Kaidan tried to speak, to breathe, and all he could do was cough and let himself be pulled to his feet. 

Dimly, he was aware of the Normandy waiting, and it was then that he understood what Shepard meant to do. He tried to refuse, to dig in his heels and tell Shepard he was an idiot if he thought he was that easy to get rid of, but he couldn’t. He was dragged closer to the Normandy with Shepard’s arm around his waist.

Finally, at long last, he could speak. Garrus was supporting him, holding him up by his armpit, but Kaidan couldn’t only see Shepard and the wasteland behind him. The Reapers had destroyed everything, had turned London into another one of their apocalyptic landscapes. He couldn’t imagine anything would ever be whole again; not Earth, not Thessia, not Palaven, not _him_.

“No,” Kaidan said. “No, Shepard.”

“I need you to stay safe,” Shepard said. “I’ll take it from here.”

“Don’t,” Kaidan whispered. “Don’t you dare. You can’t.”

Shepard came close enough to rest his hand on Kaidan’s cheek, his fingers curled under Kaidan’s jaw, his thumb stroking his cheekbone softly. “Go,” Shepard whispered, roughly, against Kaidan’s lips. He kissed him. Not like the first time, hot and wild, but like the _last_ time; like the last time he would ever kiss Kaidan again.

“Go,” Shepard repeated.

“I love you,” Kaidan said. The words were desperate, glass in his throat. He thought maybe if he said them, if he said them loud enough and long enough, Shepard would stay, Shepard wouldn’t leave him.

“I love you too,” Shepard said. He pulled back, and Kaidan reached for him, not sure what he meant to do only that he couldn’t let him go. He had never learned how to let go of him. 

“Go,” Shepard said, an order now, and Garrus dragged Kaidan onto the Normandy. The last thing Kaidan saw before he passed out was Shepard looking up at him, bloodied and defiant and still terribly small.

_No…_

In his dreams, he screamed the word, he screamed it until his throat bled and ruptured and his chest caved in. He screamed until he could scream no longer, and it echoed up into some black, pitiless sky. 

He screamed and no one heard him. 

**

Kaidan stood in the rubble with his dress blues on, barely listening as Hackett read the report of Shepard’s death. It was hot, and he was sweating through his uniform. James stood beside him, his back stiff and straight, his jaw tight, his eyes dry. Kaidan wanted to take his hand, tell him it would be okay, but he couldn’t. 

He doubted it would ever be okay again; the last thing he wanted to do was lie to him.

The galaxy moved on. 

That was the way of things, after all. No matter what happened, everything kept spinning. James stayed with the Alliance and moved around from base to base, helping to rebuild. Ashley went with him, leaving a kiss on Kaidan’s cheek and a reminder that he could call her if he ever needed her. Kaidan kept her coffee mug on his kitchen counter, smiling a little whenever he saw it.

Liara disappeared. Kaidan tried to contact her, but he knew it was a lost cause. Reaching the Shadowbroker was nearly impossible; if she needed him, she knew where to find him. 

Garrus found himself as the new Primarch when Victus’ death was confirmed. He grumbled about it, but Kaidan could tell he was excited over the chance to make a real difference back home. 

The others simply went on with their lives as best they could. It was hard without Shepard to unite them, but Kaidan made the effort, reaching out to them, keeping in contact. To the rest of the galaxy, Shepard was a hero, a legend, someone they owed their lives to, but someone they could easily allow to become a footnote in history.

For them, for the people who had known him and loved him, he was only John Shepard, Alliance Navy, the best man any of them had ever known.

Kaidan retired from the Alliance, ignoring the way Hackett looked at him. There was nothing left for him there, nothing that he could do but hold onto memories that were too painful and cut him too deeply. 

More than the others, Kaidan was too bound up in Shepard to let go of him so easily. He could only think of him hot and wet between his thighs, his mouth sealed against his throat, his thumbs digging in at his pulse. Shepard had wanted to feel that Kaidan was alive with him, that Kaidan was as warm and pulsing as he was; and he had been. God, but he had been. So alive and hungry and in love with him.

Somehow, he almost managed to let go, he almost managed to bandage his heart and dust himself off and move on. And then he heard the reports that they’d found a body in the rubble, that the body was broken and badly damaged, but _alive._

No identification had been found, and the man had been moved to ICU at one of the medical centers that had been erected after the Reapers had been destroyed. Kaidan watched the vid a few times, leaned forward with his elbows on his knees. Everything seemed to slow down. He could feel himself breathing, could hear his heart in his ears, could almost feel the blood pumping through his veins. He held his breath each time the body was pulled from the rubble, the armor stripped away, everything bloody and broken and bruised. 

“Shepard,” Kaidan whispered.

On the vid, the body took a shuddering breath.

**Author's Note:**

> Commission written for cipriharald on tumblr. :)


End file.
